Thanks to a much busier week than usual, I’m just now catching up with some of my online reading, but here are some worthwhile things I found over first two cups of coffee:

Fred Fox, Jr., author of the notorious “Jump the Shark” episode of Happy Days, defends himself against charges that the Fonz jumping the shark was the beginning of the end for that show, and describes his reaction to becoming one of the most notorious phrases in ad hoc TV criticism.

NewTeeVee asks whether smaller cable channels, such as The Hallmark Channel, might be squeezed out thanks to the recent negotiations over carriage fees between cable providers, such as Time Warner, and channels such as TNT and ESPN. We have over 100 channels I’d never miss–The Military Channel, Hallmark, etc–so I understand the temptation to eliminate some, even if I’d like to see niche programming get more protection and support.

On a related note, NewTeeVee also explores the implications of cheap iTunes rentals of individual TV episodes for television. They also offer an assessment of Hulu’s impact on broadcast TV. Perhaps lost in all of this is the impact of box sets of TV series, which now seem almost transitional as we look at how audiences access TV now.

David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson have a compendium of useful essays from their blog that address topics covered in Introduction to Film classes. These blog posts might serve as useful supplements to pretty much any Introduction to Film textbook and serve as a useful reminder of how the blogosphere is cultivating new forms of film criticism (rather than killing it as many critics have recently claimed–more on this in a longer blog post).

I’ve been following Scott Rosenberg’s series defending the practice of linking with quite a bit of enthusiasm. He is responding to Nicholas Carr’s assertion that linking serves as a form of distraction, one that inhibits understanding, rather than aiding it. Rosenberg’s third post is especially useful in that it provides a brief taxonomy of what kinds of textual effects links can have. In general, links offer new, more visible and more immediate forms of engagement, allowing us to connect with others who have similar interests.

Interesting discussion with indie filmmaking expert Peter Broderick on the future of festivals and much more (via Documentary Tech).

Also from Documentary Tech, news that the Freakonomics documentary will be released via iTunes before coming to an art house theater near you. To be honest, I’m not sure that this move is all that surprising or unusual for a film dedicated to such a specific (if relatively wide) niche. The point, especially for indie films and documentaries, seems to be to provide multiple access points and to entice audiences to view the film on the platform of their choice.

Radiohead joins the Beastie Boys and Bon Jovi in turning their fans into amateur cinematographers. Here’s the story: a group invited 50 concertgoers to record a live performance of the band using Flip video cameras that were then edited together into a concert video. Kind of fun, right? But what’s kind of cool here is the fact that Radiohead has given their Prague-based fans the actual soundboard recordings of the concert, turning what was originally an engaging amateur video into a band-endorsed concert film. The DVD is available for free from the film’s website, with the band’s blessing.